Is it a job?
Hey to everyone who works ... think about they way that you make a living. Is it a job? Is it a career? Or, is it a calling?
I think that we would all like to say that our position is a calling and that we have special gifts and talents that we are using and sharing to get paid enough money to live on. On the way to work this morning, I was listening to an audio book titled The Happiness Advantage by Sean Achor. Click here for a link to the book. The content of this audiobook is what stimulated me to revisit this though process about working people.
This started me to think about my own position and how I have viewed my "job or jobs" over my "career." The author describes a job as something that we do for the paycheck mostly. We punch in and punch out and look forward to off time.
To me a "career" is a somewhat connected period of a person's work life that utilizes skills and knowledge from one point in that career to the next and , in fact, continues to build. A calling would be a position that a person fills because he or she is called, by God, to use their skills and talents for a specific useful purpose.
There are times in my 38+ years of working that I have viewed my job as just that, a job, a way to get paid and look forward to off time. There have been times that I was fully convinced that I have a "career" in fluid power marketing and advertising. By the way, I am still going with that description, career, as the one that best describes my professional journey.
But a calling? How many of us are fortunate enough to make a living from what we know is a calling. To teach others how to read or do arithmetic sounds like a calling. Working in a truly charitable organization sounds like a calling. Feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless, reaching out to those in need all describe what I would consider a calling.
There are other "callings" and I really wish that any reader of this blog would (even anonymously) share their idea of what is a calling. Do you have an idea? What is your calling? If you know, what are you waiting for?
I think that we would all like to say that our position is a calling and that we have special gifts and talents that we are using and sharing to get paid enough money to live on. On the way to work this morning, I was listening to an audio book titled The Happiness Advantage by Sean Achor. Click here for a link to the book. The content of this audiobook is what stimulated me to revisit this though process about working people.
This started me to think about my own position and how I have viewed my "job or jobs" over my "career." The author describes a job as something that we do for the paycheck mostly. We punch in and punch out and look forward to off time.
To me a "career" is a somewhat connected period of a person's work life that utilizes skills and knowledge from one point in that career to the next and , in fact, continues to build. A calling would be a position that a person fills because he or she is called, by God, to use their skills and talents for a specific useful purpose.
There are times in my 38+ years of working that I have viewed my job as just that, a job, a way to get paid and look forward to off time. There have been times that I was fully convinced that I have a "career" in fluid power marketing and advertising. By the way, I am still going with that description, career, as the one that best describes my professional journey.
But a calling? How many of us are fortunate enough to make a living from what we know is a calling. To teach others how to read or do arithmetic sounds like a calling. Working in a truly charitable organization sounds like a calling. Feeding the hungry, sheltering the homeless, reaching out to those in need all describe what I would consider a calling.
There are other "callings" and I really wish that any reader of this blog would (even anonymously) share their idea of what is a calling. Do you have an idea? What is your calling? If you know, what are you waiting for?
